The present invention is directed to a system for supporting an equipment housing on a surface, and more particularly to a support system which can easily be adjusted to level the equipment housing.
Some equipment, such as medical diagnostic equipment, must be level in order to achieve optimum performance. Screw-adjustable legs are known for this purpose. Such legs are typically used at the four corners of the housing and their lengths are adjusted as necessary to make the housing level. Additional screw-adjustable legs may be used to provide further support if the equipment is particularly heavy.
Most people have experienced unstable tables or chairs which wobble because their legs are slightly different in length or because the legs rest on an uneven surface. The same problem is present in equipment housings. If an equipment housing has four or more screw-adjustable legs, the length of each leg must be adjusted precisely with respect to the other legs so that each leg bears its share of the total weight and does not extend so far that it lifts other legs from the supporting surface.
A table or chair with three legs does not suffer from this instability problem. From a geometrical point of view, the table or chair is supported at a fixed distance from each of three points defined by the feet of the legs, regardless of their length. An equipment housing could also be supported stably if three screw-adjustable legs were used. However, equipment housings are typically rectangular. If two legs were used adjacent one end and the third leg adjacent the other, the third leg would generally support approximately the same weight as the first two legs together (assuming that the weight is uniformly distributed within the housing). This increased load on the third leg might damage the surface on which it rests. Furthermore, if the third leg is sufficiently rugged to bear its share of the weight, the first two legs would have to be unnecessarily rugged if they are selected to match the third leg and thus present the same visual appearance.